Coffee with Mr. Casey

4 - I Want Candy

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Jonathan Casey

Ahh, big brown-eyed Lola Farber. I don’t necessarily know what is wrong with that girl, only that she’s childish and has a loud mouth. She’s the typical high school senior troublemaker, vying for anyone’s attention. Her actions only made me think she was doing these little things on purpose. I saw the way she glared at me in the office. How many times did I have to tell her not to chew gum, or be on time? It isn’t that hard.

Maybe I did overreact a bit by getting her suspended. After all, she did have that massive bruise on her cheek, which would explain why she had been in the bathroom. Even though Lola looked pretty banged up, I wondered what the other girl looked like. I had to admit that she was a tough girl, but it seemed like there was something missing. Still, she should know better than to fight.

 I looked through all of her files, taking note of her decent grades, and the prior years before that were untouched when it came to getting in any kind of trouble.

I just went strictly by the rules and she obviously didn’t. Just like when she ran out those exit doors… Another detention will result in expulsion. So I had a choice: let her go out those side doors and just forget about it, or call the school security office, who would be on it within seconds. Mr. Reynolds wasn’t going to be pleased with me when he finds out that I didn’t catch her.

With the way Lola was running, she would have been long gone by the time I got to the doors. It struck me odd that she would involve her friend in the very illegal act of truancy. I just hoped that other girl had perfect attendance.

The halls started to empty indicating that the bell was going to ring any second. I made my way back to the freshman hall, room 203. A group of girls huddled their desks together in a whispering frenzy. Boys were throwing paper balls into their hair without them even being aware. I quietly walked to my desk and sat down. The whispers simmered down as soon as everyone noticed I was in here. See? These kids were respectful, coming in class on time and mouths closed. Just a little bit of that from Ms. Farber would be nice. At least I didn’t have to deal with her for three days.

Calling out roll, students raised their hand when I mumbled his or her last name. Every student was present, which was a rare occasion, but I never had to give out a detention for tardiness. The talking and laughter soon picked up when I passed out the papers I’d finally graded. I think the highest one was a B, and it was a low B at that. I didn’t know if I was grading too harshly but a lot of them were just a few sentences long, and some didn’t even turn anything in. I was going to dread parent-teacher conferences this semester.

After school let out, I was finally able to relax in the classroom with my cup of coffee. I sat still in my annoyingly squeaky chair and waited for any kids that had detentions. It seemed that Lola was the only one who’d been having them lately so I spent the next hour and a half alone, reading an old book I found when I moved into the apartment. It was mostly short stories and poetry, all about love—hopeless, tragic love.

I slapped the book closed and sat it on top of my chaos of pens and pencils in the wooden drawer of my desk. I looked at my mug and smiled. No more poetry. Just coffee. I was going for a sip until an echoing knock came to the door. Mr. Reynolds slipped in quietly as if there were people in here.

“Hello, Dwayne,” I said, setting my cup back down on the permanent ring stain left from the last teacher.

“Hey, Johnny, sorry to bother you but you didn’t happen to see Lola after you left the office? She and another student went AWOL.” He searched my face with intense scrutiny as if he knew that I did see her.